“IF”

If I take you to dinner will you take me to bed?

If I take you to church will you forgive me?

If I let you sleep in will you cook me breakfast?

If I answer the phone will you call back?

Again?

Take this dance and make it as awkward and unnecessary as the future
called “the morning after.”

Take my hopes
and scream them aloud
in the wake of every failure, of every destruction of dream my dream of
love has set forth;
to the world. To my horror.

Take the time to speak of your beautiful, treacherous, independence as
you douse the lights and turn down the covers.
And I agree with every word.

Because in these moments
when everything is possible
the end has already been written.

It breaks my heart to laugh with you
and it makes you uncomfortable
that you feel so at home with me.

If time wrote the past in strokes of compassion on the memory the soul
wouldn’t fear it.
And pride wouldn’t be forced to force “reality”
down our throats dissing illusion if only to ‘protect’ our hearts.

And as our senses dull to the brilliant shine of possibility
the possibility of something that might work
gets blurred by impatience and lack of faith,
in people,…
In ourselves.

And in those few awkward and unnecessary phone calls that follow I
will know why.
And you will know why we don’t work.

But for tonight-

Let’s speak of the need to be sober in love. And imbibe the reasons for
why
we’ve failed in a series of allusions to some common thought and
inference. Let’s share in the drowning of those shared emotions,
as we move further away from what we’ve always sought. Because as we
gladly watch our cynicism grow drunk and faithless, the sparks-
the similarities between us-
fade too in a feeling of familiarity that whispers ” a match…” before
it’s gone

Desire and need get “blurred” with objectivity and the many reasons why
you
And I
Deserve better.
I’ll trade you a “how could she?” for a “why would he?”

And as the wine turns time on it’s side and the reason that brought two
such
Splendidly, similar people together slips into the past we can speed a
lifetime of understanding into the vacuous hours of this night and live
a lifetime of possibility til dawn

AND,
If I find your arms familiar at daybreak,
If I kiss you’re forehead and slip back to sleep-

Will you let me?

If I don’t ask YOU for more-
Will YOU do it for me?

Please…

If I answer the phone will you call back? again?
If I call you first will you respect me?
What if I then make you wait?

How many days does it buy me?

Us?